412131 external_news 1433840350 1475893655 “The suburbs were built for the Baby Boomers [people born between 1946 and 1964] but they will not be able to age gracefully there,” said Ellen Dunham-Jones, a Georgia Tech professor of architecture and urban design. “The privacy that they valued when they were raising their family, now entraps them and isolates them.” While suburbanites might still love their individual homes, they are not enamored of all of the driving, traffic and congestion they often encounter. Atlhough the burbs were designed for kids and stay-at-home moms, the majority of modern-day mothers work outside the home. Dunham-Jones believes the working mom who is trying to shuttle her kids around to all of their activities is probably the least served by the suburban model.  And then there’s the inconvenient fact that although the suburbs were designed with families in mind, since 2000, two-thirds of suburban households have not had kids in them. All of which means, the suburbs don’t seem to be serving anyone effectively — not the aging baby boomers, the working families with children, or the majority of households with no children.

]]> 2015-06-03 1224